Ordering in: A halal roast duck delivery service launched during the pandemic

When the Covid-19 pandemic first started in early 2020, Rashdan Alan Manan and Liza Zainudin realised that there was a massive opportunity to venture into and capitalise on the lack of competition in the halal roast duck market.

“There are no major players in the halal roast duck segment. Other halal duck providers are more premium operators in upscale hotels and their target demographic is also more premium, so we thought there was plenty of potential. Looking back now, I think we targeted the right market,” says Rashdan, better known as Dan.

Dan and Liza initially started their online food delivery business called Halal Roast Duck by Duckout in a home kitchen, with Liza, who has a culinary arts background, spearheading the roasting of the ducks. Eventually, with business flourishing, they moved into a cloud kitchen.

According to Dan, they learnt a lot during the initial lockdown and the two quickly realised that despite specialising in roast duck, they also had to broaden their menu range if they wanted to capture a wider market.

“We learnt a lot in the beginning – from managing our inventory to meeting customer demand. We soon learnt we had to offer new menus, hence from just doing halal roast duck, we skewed to offering roast chicken as well, because we had to make our brand on par with the market,” says Dan.

In terms of perfecting their flagship dish – roast duck – Dan says the challenge is in monitoring the duck from start to finish to ensure a consistent result time and time again.

“Roasting duck is a rather delicate procedure, so we have two employees on hand to monitor the ducks every morning, from marinating the duck for six to 12 hours, to basting it and roasting it according to a set time and temperature,” says Dan.

The brand specialises in two kinds of roast duck – a Cantonese-style one that mimics the popular variant available in Chinese restaurants in Malaysia as well as a Balinese iteration that aims to duplicate the island’s famed Bebek Tepi Sawah Restaurant’s delicious fried poultry (although the brand’s version is roasted).

From the menu offerings, definitely try the Balinese Duck Indo Mee (RM19.50). Here, you will discover roast duck alongside a heaping serving of the ubiquitous Indo Mee, with duck-stuffed tofu, spicy tempe and sambal hijau rounding out this offering.

The duck is the undisputed star of this show and instantly threatens to pull off a coup with its burnished golden-brown skin, the rich light layer of fat resting languidly under this canopy and the succulent meat beneath.

All the other components here add fiery verve to the meal, from the ridiculously good spicy fried tempe to the noodles itself, which are springy to the touch. The duck-stuffed tofu is crispy and filled mostly with potato, with a smattering of duck interspersed in between. The tofu is lacklustre on its own but taken to an altogether elevated dimension when paired with the fiery dark sauce on the side, which straddles the sweet-spicy divide with aplomb.

The Cantonese Duck Wanton noodles (RM15.50) offers yet more duck goodness. Here, the roast duck complements the oil-slick wanton egg noodles well. The chilli oil and soy sauce on the side give the duck an extra spice plus sodium kick that is well and truly appreciated.

Moving on to other brethren in the poultry family, you could opt to try the Roasted Chicken Rice (RM10.50). The chicken is roasted extremely well and boasts a lovely crackly carapace that gives way to tender meat. The rice is not as flavourful as traditional iterations of chicken rice that you might have had, but this omission is quickly forgiven once you taste the homemade vegetable soup, which is light but packed with flavour.

Moving forward, Dan says that he and Liza have quickly figured out that if they want to grow organically, they will have to spread their wings (pun intended) and open a physical outlet. This is also because they have sussed out that roast duck tastes best when served piping hot, without delivery delays getting in the way.

“When you eat Peking duck or roast duck, it is supposed to be served hot and the skin is supposed to be crispy. But when this is done via delivery, those elements in our roast duck tend to not be consistent because of the delivery time. If it takes time for the customer to receive the food, the duck is cold and the skin becomes chewy.

“So in a way, we have to expand to dine-in, so people can experience the real taste of our roast ducks,” says Dan.

For now, Dan and Liza are getting all their ducks in a row first (see what we did there?). Step one is to expand their presence in the Klang Valley by operating out of more cloud kitchens and widening their customer base. Next year, their goal is to have a brick-and-mortar eatery to complement their delivery business.

“Customer reception was initially tremendously good for roast duck deliveries, but when the market opened for dine-in, our sales become just slightly above average. We are still able to survive, but we are definitely looking to open for dine-in by 2023 or 2024 at the latest,” confirms Dan.